Koala FX delivered the complete visual effects for Trap House — an action-packed thriller filled with gunfights, explosions, and high-speed chases. The project demanded a bold and flexible approach to visual effects, blending realism with cinematic intensity.
In total, the film featured around 700 VFX shots, each requiring meticulous attention to continuity, lighting, and texture. The most technically demanding sequence was the Dust Storm — a defining moment for Koala FX that pushed the studio to invent new AI-driven tools and workflows designed to balance high fidelity with production efficiency.
Koala FX collaborated closely with the filmmakers to define the visual language of the storm, exploring variations in density, motion, and atmosphere to achieve both physical believability and emotional impact. Once the creative direction was set, the team built a robust technical framework around three key pillars: Depth, Interaction, and Volumetric Light.
Traditional 3D simulation methods would have been too resource-intensive for such a small team, so KoalaFX pioneered a smarter, hybrid pipeline. Using AI depth-generation models, the team reconstructed detailed depth passes directly from live-action plates. These were enhanced with temporal filtering, denoising, and frame interpolation to ensure consistency and stability across shots. Foreground and background layers were then refined through AI masking and manual rotoscoping, enabling precise control without costly re-renders.
